Tennis Blog

The San Diego Aviators lead the Orange County Breakers 2 matches to 1 in the raucous opening series of the 2016 World Team Tennis season. Each team match was hard fought with several keeping teams in contention to the last game or even point. The concentrated season is a chance for tennis professionals to stay in shape in the lull after Wimbledon and the run up tournaments before the 2016 U.S. Open Championships.

Professional team tennis returns to the Southern California area as the San Diego Aviators kick off their Mylan World Team Tennis season at the Omni La Costa Resort & Spa in Carlsbad, California. This year the Aviators (again coached by tennis pro mainstay John Lloyd the former longtime British Davis Cup team coach) are fielding a number of successful returning players and some exciting new tennis pros.

Is the grass? This year following and even during the 2016 Wimbledon tennis championships three top tennis professional Dominka Civuklkova, Ana Ivanovic, and even youngster and Ranch Santa Fe, CA resident Taylor Fritz made their intentions clear and either wed or got engaged.
Do two weeks among the stuffy traditionalists at the All England Lawn Tennis & Croquet Club influence the couples to make it legal? Or could it be the mandatory whites that inspire the potential brides and their beaus to take the plunge?

Tennis players typically spend much time and money researching and buying the best tennis racquet for their style of play and skill level. But if they skip or rush through the vital step of choosing the right tennis racquet grip size all of that previous effort is wasted. The wrong grip can be uncomfortable and affect a tennis players swing control, match endurance, shot mechanics and overall confidence. The right tennis grip size can improve all those aspects of your tennis game.

The hottest fashion trend in designer tennis bags is the sling model. Slim and stylish they are a departure from the large bulky duffel bags of the past. Court Couture has introduced a fabulous line of sling designs they’ve called the Barcelona. As hot as a midday tennis match on a red clay court in Spain, these tennis bags for women even come with a matching clutch for that post match lunch or tennis pro-shop purchase.

It’s unlikely anyone can match the Bryan Brothers success on the doubles tennis court. But all players can improve their game by working on tennis drills that are specifically designed for doubles. Be like Mike and Bob and get ready for some super-fast double volleying action with a new tennis grip and give these drills a try.

Once you progressed past beginner level tennis and have become a consistent intermediate level tennis player it is worth getting a tennis racquet that better matches you current game. Avoid the temptation to jump ahead and buy an extreme high performance racquet better suited to advanced level players. A relatively heavy racquet with too small a head size is less forgiving of errant strokes will just demoralize you and reduce the enjoyment of your tennis play. There are a many good choices among the best tennis racquets for intermediate players.

It’s tough to come up with enough superlatives to describe the talents and accomplishments of Bob and Mike Bryan, the grandmasters of tennis doubles. The Bryan Brothers combined to win a record 16 Grand Slam men’s tennis doubles championships and record 112 professional doubles tournaments overall. The most weeks ranked #1 (440 plus for both men), most Davis Cup doubles wins (23), most consecutive Grand Slam Finals (7), most prize money, an Olympic Gold Medal, and on and on and on. They even have several mixed doubles Grand Slam championships playing the best women players. Mike and Bob Bryan have single-handily (or is it double-handily?) transformed and raised the profile of professional tennis doubles.

One of charming and for pro tennis players sometimes infuriating aspects of the Wimbledon tennis tournament is the very British requirements for Wimbledon white apparel. The origin of the whites apparently goes back to the late 1800s, when it was improper to have ladies perspire or show sweat stains. To mask that apparent outrage they started wearing all white. And it was in cotton flannel. Good thing England is cool and rainy-even sometime during the famous fortnight. The male tennis players soon followed suit. The tradition became rooted the manicured lawns of the All England Croquet & Lawn Tennis Club.

Wimbledon 2016 is the most famous tennis championship around, but many of us never have a chance to play tennis on a grass surface. Although it is the original tennis surface (remember its really called “lawn tennis”) less than 1% of courts in the United States are grass. If you ever are scheduled to play on a grass tennis court there are some tennis training tips for your tennis practice sessions. These tennis drills for grass court play courtesy of Micah Groom, Co-director of Player Development for the North County Tennis Academy in San Diego County in California and a USPTR certified professional.